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This dish makes me happy because of the sweet surprise inside each and every cupcake. You can make up a batch and most everyone will assume you have baked up a nice pumpkin bread. Little do they know that when they take a bite, their taste buds will be met with a wonderful pocket of Nutella. The chocolate pumpkin combination is dreamy and delicious... not to mention the pecan topping that adds the perfect bit of crunch. There is nothing better than filling your whole house with the smell of spice filled pumpkin on a cold day all throughout the fall and winter.

This recipe was developed when I scoured the internet for pumpkin recipes. I could not find anything that seemed to stand out enough, but I took the base of a pumpkin poundcake from the blog Sing for Your Supper. I tweaked the ingredients for her pumpkin pound cake, and then transformed it into another dish with Nutella and chopped pecans and perfectly portioned cupcakes. —LittleKitchen

Makes 24 cupcakes

1cup granulated sugar

1cup brown sugar

1cup vegetable oil

3 extra large eggs

3cups all purpose flour

2teaspoons baking soda

1 1/2teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 1/2teaspoons ground nutmeg

1/2teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

15ounces canned pumpkin

24 teaspoons Nutella

2cups roughly chopped pecans

In a large bowl, combine sugar and oil until blended. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt, cloves and pudding mix; add to egg mixture alternately with pumpkin, beating well after each addition.

Line two 12-cup cupcake pans with cupcake liners. Fill each cup 1/3 full with the pumpkin batter. Place 1 teaspoon of Nutella in the middle of each cup on top of the pumpkin batter.

Using a toothpick, swirl each dollop of Nutella slightly into the batter. Top each cup with more batter until they are filled 3/4 full. Top each cupcake with pecans completely covering the batter. Pack the pecans in tight because they will spread out once the batter rises a bit. Bake each pan for 25 minutes. Cool for 20 minutes and then remove from pan and cool completely.